TO KARL RADEK

Written:Written before August 4, 1915Published:First published in 1930 in LeninMiscellany XIV.

      Sent from Sörenberg to Berne.

      Printed from the original.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1971,

      Moscow,Volume 36,

      pages334-336.Translated:Andrew RothsteinTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive.You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work, as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.

DearComrade Radek,

Ihave received your letter to Wijnkoop, and am sending
it off by the first post. I am adding that work should be
started right away, if the idea is to prepare a declaration
(to say nothing of anotherCommunist Manifesto).

Wehave provided (1) a manifesto; (2) resolutions; (3)
a draft
declaration.[3]So let us have your amendments
or counterdrafts as soon as possible. Hurry! Or we shall
be late!

Ipersonally am againstNashe Slovoparticipating, but
would not make this an ultimatum. Why am I against?
(1) It is corruption, becauseNashe Slovohas notitselfdeclared that it is anindependentor third (apart from
the C.C. and O.C.) party or group for work in Russia;
(2)
There are0.C. supportersinNashe Slovoin numbers
unknown to the public. This is dual representation! (O.C.+Nashe Slovo).
(3)Nashe Slovois for the Chkheidze faction
in the Duma (and the O.C.and Plekhanov+Alexinsky are
also for it). Isn’t that corruption?

TakingLichtstrahlenas agroup, and considering it more
important than Zetkin’s, isnotfunny.

Thisgroup includes Borchardt+Radek+contributors toLichtstrahlen. That is enough.

Thisgroup has a little journal (while Zetkin and Co.
haven’t got one).

Borchardtwas the first to say publicly:Die
Sozialdemokratie
abgedankt.[1][4]That was not propaganda but a most
important political act.It was action, and not promise.

Themost important thing for us (i.e., all the Left) is
a clear, complete, precisePrinzipienerklärung.[2]Without
this all the so-called programmes of action are nothing
but talk and deception. What did the Zetkin “resolution
of action” in Berne come to?Nothingin terms of action!
Nothing in terms of
principle![5]

TheBorchardt group, if it comes forward (together with
us or separately) as an anonymous group (Stern, orPfeil,
or whatever) with a clear-cutPrinzipienerklärung+a call
torevolutionaryaction, will play an outstanding part in
world history.

Meanwhile,Zetkin and Co., havingeverythingin their
hands (newspapers, journals, connections withBerner
Tagwacht, the opportunity of visiting Switzerland, etc.), have
donenothingin 10 months to unite the international Left.
This is a disgrace.

Allthe best,Yours,Lenin

P.S.I advise younotto enlist. It’s stupid to help the
enemy. You will be doing a service to the Scheidemanns.
Better emigrate. Really, that will be better. There is now
a desperate need of Left-wing workers.

“Theopposition in Germany is the product of ferment
among the masses,whereasthe Bolsheviks represent the
orientation of a little group of revolutionaries.”

Thatis not the Marxist approach.

Itis Kautskianism—or a dodge.

Whatwas the 1847Communist Manifestoand its group?
The product of ferment among the masses? Or the
orientation of a little group of revolutionaries? Orboththe one
and the other?

Andwhat are we, the Central Committee? Or hasn’t
the R.S.D.L. Duma group proved that there are links with
the masses? And what about thePetrograd Proletarsky
Golos? Or is thereno“ferment among the masses” in Russia?

TheLeft in Germany will make a historic mistake if,
on the pretext that they (they =Zetkin, Laufenberg,Borchardt, Thalheimer, Duncker! Ha, ha!) are “the product
of ferment among the masses”, they refuse to come forward
with aPrinzipienerklärung(anonymously, on behalf of aSterngroup, etc. Later the workers willsupportit andthinkabout it).

Thereis need for a Left statement and programme so as
to develop the “ferment among the masses”. It is necessarybecauseof such ferment. It is necessary so as to transform
the “ferment” into a “movement”.It is necessary so asto develop “ferment” in the rotten International.

Andimmediately!

Youare quite, quitewrong!

P.S.You didn’t say clearly in your letter to Wijnkoop
whether it was set or proposed for August 20. Drop meand Grigorya line about this (if it is urgent).

Rakovsky(see his
pamphlet)[6]isfordefence of the
fatherland. To my mind, we should part company with
such people.

[1]TheSocial-Democratsrecanted.—Ed.

[2]Statementof principles.—Ed.

[3]Areference to the drafts of a manifesto, declaration and
resolutions written for preliminary discussion among Left-wing
delegates of various socialist parties and for subsequent motioning
at the Zimmerwald Conference on behalf of the Left (see present
edition, Vol. 35, pp. 193–94).

[4]J.Borchardt’spamphlet,Vor und nach dem 4. August 1914. Hat
die deutsche Sozialdemokratie abgedankt?Verlag der Lichtstrahlen
(Before and After August 4, 1914. Have the German
Social-Democrats Recanted? Lichtstrahlen Publishers), Berlin, 1915, in
which he first sharply criticised the treacherous behaviour of
German Social-Democrats at the outbreak of the war. For Lenin’s
opinion on this pamphlet see present edition, Vol. 21, p. 130.

[5]Areference to the resolution adopted by the International
Conference of Socialist Women held in Berne from March 26 to 28,
1915. See Lenin’s article “On the Struggle Against
Social-Chauvinism” (present edition, Vol. 21, pp. 199–203).

[6]Ch.Dumas,C. Racovski,Les Socialises et la Guerre, Bucharest,
1915.